


Wielder of the Millennium Ring

by MsChievous



Series: Whump/Inktober 2019 [2]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Angst, Dark Side of Dimensions, Gen, Light Angst, Ryou needs a break, Ryou's dad lives, a little au, because the YGO lore regarding Ryou is inconsistent as fuck, everone else does not, maybe? maybe i'm just desensitized
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-03
Updated: 2019-10-03
Packaged: 2020-11-22 20:42:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20880371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MsChievous/pseuds/MsChievous
Summary: For Day 1 of Inktober that I'm totally not on time for because I suck!Ryou follows his father to a strange tomb in the middle of the night, and things go horribly awry when his father picks up a weird golden amulet.





	Wielder of the Millennium Ring

**Author's Note:**

> Man, I haven't written Yu-Gi-Oh fanfic in a hot minute. I still love my boi so much tho, and this prompt was basically MADE for him.

Ryou crouched among the crates for whatever cover they provide. Papa somehow hadn’t noticed him yet, which was… odd. He seemed particularly driven. After that storekeeper had mentioned something about a ring… Papa seemed to almost forget him. So an insufferable curiosity lead him to follow Papa late out into the night when he really should be sleeping. But if the ring was something cool, he wanted to see it too.

Papa’s boat docked near a series of smaller pyramids. Papa had been excavating nearby and had said another company was protecting them which seemed like a stupid reason not to go near them. After all, there could be treasure there!

And Papa seemed to agree. Instead of going to the site  _ he _ was excavating, he strode purposefully towards the smaller, off-limits pyramid. Ryou kept back a ways, clinging to the shadows like those American superheroes he had read about, but Papa didn’t even look back. 

He walked right into the pyramid, which again was weird. Usually, there were security guards and fences to keep people from getting too close. A twisty feeling curled Ryou’s stomach as he followed Papa into the pyramid. 

The path forward was clear. He had heard stories of tombs of ancient pharaohs who had booby traps everywhere, and mazes and trap doors, but this pyramid seemed… lived in, almost. There wasn’t a lot of dust or cobwebs, and the air didn’t seem as musty as the other pyramids he’s been to.

Finally, the path ended in a stone archway that seemed to lead to a large room. Beyond it, Ryou heard faint voices, pitched low in discussion. At the sound, Papa rushed forward into the room, out of sight. Despite the fear pounding in his throat, Ryou crept forward, ducking behind a column and peering around to see what Papa was after.

A bald man draped in white and cream stepped in front of a group of kids his age. “Young ones,” he murmured in Arabic, “stay and do not follow.” He walked up to meet Papa with a calm expression.

Papa, however, barely seemed to notice the man. “I’ve finally found this place! And there it is, the ancient stone!” He brushed past the bald man, instead kneeling in front of a strange sarcapho-thingie Ryou couldn’t remember the name of. “And just as the ancient texts have said, the golden Ring is inside it!” Papa dug into his satchel, pulling out handfuls of money. “Just tell me your price, whatever it is, I’ll pay! I must have that Ring!”

His urgency scared Ryou, he had never seen Papa so frantic, even when they had missed their flight back to Japan for an important banquet in Papa’s honor. He was always calm and level-headed, but that Ring...

The bald man interrupted his thoughts. “You are mistaken. The Millennium Ring is not an object one can possess.  _ It _ possesses  _ you _ . It has powers even I do not fully understand”

That sounded silly to Ryou. A ring  _ was _ a thing people could have. Papa still had his mother’s ring, so maybe this one was similar? Papa seemed to have the same idea. 

“I do not care! I’ve been searching for this my whole  _ life _ ! Please, sir!”

“It is not my place to interfere with what destiny has in store,” the bald man sighed, and a part of Ryou relaxed. If Papa really  _ had  _ been looking for this so long, then it was good that he had found it. Maybe then they wouldn’t have to always be traveling… “you’ve been warned. But if you still want the Ring, it’s yours.”

Papa surged forward and lifted a strange gold amulet around his neck, not much like a ring at all, Ryou thought. 

“It feels amazing!” Papa shouted, pressing a hand to its surface, “like nothing I’ve ever experienced!” He laughed, and Ryou almost crept out from his hiding place to get a closer look at what Papa had got, but almost as soon as the laughing had started, it stopped with Papa’s agonizing scream.

Ryou jumped out with a cry of “No!” as a dark fog burst from the amulet around Papa’s neck. It coiled in the air then struck back at Papa, knocking him almost across the room. “Papa!” he rushed forward, memories of his mother laying on the road flashing through his mind. No, Papa couldn’t die, who would he have if Papa died too?

Papa turned his head and managed to gasp out, “Th-the Ring. Where is it?”

Ryou glanced to the side and caught a glimpse of its gold sheen. “There, I’ll go get it,” He scrambled over and picked it up. It was so beautiful and shiny and… and warm to the touch. He felt a wave of some kind of power, and a high-pitched noise like a yell or a scream, and then… nothing.

* * *

It felt good to send that miserable guardian and his pesky plana gremlins to the Shadow Realm. He wasn’t sure how long they’d be stuck there - not nearly as long as he had been trapped, but still- he was getting antsy.

Dark energies swirled around his fingertips and he clenched his fist. Thousands of years trapped by that insufferable old wretch, and a mere child was the one to free him? How apropos….

The sniveling human at his feet, though… that was a conundrum. While his Host wasn’t quite awake, his emotions were strong… contagious. And the last thing his Host wanted was for this man to die. Vexing.

“Ryou… you have the Ring! Give it to me, and Amane and your mother will-”

“No, I don’t think I will,” he replied, looking down his nose and wondering whether he could “accidentally” send this man to the Shadow Realm for a few minutes to cow him with the full extent of his power, but…

“What? Ryou, give it to me, now!” A shaky hand darted out and snapped around his wrist, either attempting to drag his Host down or himself up. Either way, this was getting out of hand. 

He wrenched the pathetic mortal’s hand away easily, and allowed the shadow magic to seep into the cracks in the ground, and up the walls, twisting into suffocating darkness. “You don’t seem to understand.  _ You _ are not worthy of my power. So if you do not wish for a fate more painful than death, you will leave my Host alone,” he hissed, twisting the man’s mind to heed his words.

When he finally let go, the mortal collapsed in a quivering heap on the ground, shuddering against the pull of shadow magic that no doubt collected in the form of his worst fears. He paused, considering the sniveling blob of humanity in front of him and tried to muster up the willpower to repress his Host’s emotions and just end this man’s life, but to no avail.

Bother.

* * *

Ryou blinked up at the ceiling, confused. Something felt… off. He propped himself up and looked around.

He was in the hotel room, sleeping on his bed, but Papa… 

“What are you doing?”

Papa jumped at the sound of Ryou’s voice and looked… scared? “O-oh, Ryou, we’re leaving. Some things came up and I-I-I’m needed back home for a bit, okay?”

Ryou tilted his head to the side, then glanced out at the night sky through the window. “Oh. Right now?”

“Yes. I’m getting our things ready, so you can just sit there, okay?”

Before he could respond, the boy became aware of a warm weight around his neck. He glanced down and saw a brilliant gold amulet, a triangle inlaid into a circle, and five tassels splayed equidistant around the bottom half. He touched it experimentally, then looked back at Papa. “What’s this?”

Papa looked uncomfortable, “I got it from a vendor on the way back from a dig site. You said you liked it, don’t you remember? Y-you did have a bit of, uh, heatstroke back there, so, so maybe you don’t?”

Ryou blinked. “Oh. What’s heatstroke?”

“You get too hot. That-that’s probably why you’re not remembering. Don’t worry, you’re fine now.

“Okay,” he responded. Heatstroke, that was why he felt so funny. So why did he feel like Papa was lying to him?

**Author's Note:**

> again, it's a little AU because in DSoD, Ryou tells Aigami "I lost someone on that day too", but then in the manga, his father runs the Domino Museum where the final battle takes place. So I made it a more symbolic "lost someone" where his father became very distant bc he was scared of what Yami Bakura could do to him ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> idk fite me except actually don't because I'm soft and scared


End file.
